


Benediction

by ambyr



Category: Under Jurisdiction - Susan Matthews
Genre: Gen, Grief, Mourning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-12-16
Updated: 2010-12-16
Packaged: 2017-10-13 17:19:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,368
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/139723
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ambyr/pseuds/ambyr
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>One year after Port Rudistal.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Benediction

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Dira Sudis (dsudis)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/dsudis/gifts).



Robert found the officer in the training room. Not the usual one, with its mats and padded walls, and not the track that ran along the ship's outer corridors, but a tiny room buried deep in the hull that he doubted anyone had used for its original purpose since the _Ragnarok_ was first commissioned. As a place to rest for a spell, or to hold liaisons undisturbed, well. That use it had certainly seen, as he could vouch for.

That was how he knew its sloping walls and slightly misaligned door hid something unusual: a target, not thick enough to withstand energy blasts, but the right size, the right shape, for primitive projectile weapons. Arrows. Darts. Knives.

Fleet didn't train in those, as a rule. There wasn't much call to carry bows on a spaceship, and knives were for hand-to-hand combat. At a distance, one used a gun, unless one was an antique weapons enthusiast. Or Andrej Koscuisko.

Robert watched through the cracked door, which had never closed properly, as his officer flung a knife forward in one smooth motion to stick in the target's middle ring. If his aim was usually better than that, well, the almost empty bottle in his right hand explained that.

That, and the date, which Robert knew as well as the date of his own bond.

He hadn't had it burned into his skin, as the officer had. Hadn't stood there, drenched in Joslire's blood. Hadn't been there at all, though he should have, and oh, that was an old wound, one there was no sense in dwelling on. He hadn't been there, but he still knew the day of Joslire's death, and this, its first anniversary.

And of course the officer would be here, now, practicing with the weapons that were all he had left of Joslire. Chief Stildyne wouldn't know. Chief Stildyne probably didn't know Koscuisko _had_ knives; the officer was careful, oh so careful, never to undress in front of him.

That, though, was between the Chief and the officer. If the officer wanted privacy of his person, that was all well and good. And it was only right and proper for him to find space to mourn. But there was a wide gap, Robert thought, between "space to mourn" and "completely alone." Especially on _Ragnarok_ , where they had been only a few months and their place was still far from settled. The Chief Engineer, for one, would as soon punch Koscuisko through a wall as give him good-greetings.

No, it was not a good environment for the Chief Medical Officer to be wandering about unescorted, even aside from the trouble the officer could get himself into with his own knives. Which is why Robert had made his way here as quickly as he could without the Chief catching wind of it, thinking fiercely all the while that it was for the officer's sake, what the officer would desire, and never mind what the Chief had or hadn't asked of him.

Inside the room, Koscuisko threw his fourth knife, then turned his head. The gesture was slow enough that it looked almost graceful, but Robert could see the liquor slosh where the officer's right hand shook with the tension of keeping his motions controlled.

"Yes, what is it, Robert? Have you need of me?" The words were cool, the expression guileless. It was enough to put Robert on his toes, if he hadn't been already.

"No, sir." The officer would not take well to being told he shouldn't be alone, wouldn't take well to the implication that he couldn't look after himself. "Only hoped to practice at knives," Robert improvised. "Of course will wait til you've finished, sir."

"No, no." Koscuisko waved his hands expansively, nearly spilling his drink, as he strode down the range. He pulled the five-knives from the target quickly, gesturing with them as well in a way that made Robert flinch. "I have finished, as you see. You must take a turn. And have you been practicing, as my Joslire taught to you?" The name came out with hardly a tremor. More than one bottle of drinkable, then.

"Yes, sir," Robert said, but he couldn't deny hearing Joslire's name on the officer's lips set him off-balance. He threw his boot knife and watched it fly wide, clanging against the much-nicked wall behind the target. He and the officer listened to it clatter to the ground in silence.

"Well," the officer said, while Robert was still busy cringing. "Fleet issue was never so well balanced. Is that not what Kaydence used to say? You will try again, using mine."

A slight gesture, and a knife sprang from his arm sheath. Robert had seen the sheaths, had helped the officer strap them on time and time again, and still didn't understand how they worked. Didn't understand the mechanism that let the knives appear and disappear so smoothly. And he was thinking this, thinking about springs and oiled leather and angles, because it kept him from having to think about the knife that his officer was so unexpectedly holding out to him, hilt first, in his left hand.

He had helped the officer strap on the sheaths, yes, had even oiled the leather and polished the buckles, but he hadn't touched the knives, not for a year. The officer did that himself, and never mind how tired he was or how much he had been drinking. They were his knives, Joslire's knives. Sacred.

The officer waved the knife at him, impatient now. There was nothing for it but to reach out and take the blade.

It was a plain blade, to look at. Not so different from fleet-issue, really, for all that the balance was better. But when he touched it, he swore he felt a chill that had nothing to do with the cold of the room, a shudder that had nothing to do with the officer's trembling fingers.

He wanted to hold onto it, suddenly. To cling to it, as the last, best part of Joslire, and whisper words he had never gotten to say. He had always been sentimental.

Instead he threw it, hard and fast, before thought could turn to deed. Threw it without looking at the target, and then tracked its path to watch it land, perfectly straight, in the bull's eye center.

"Joslire guides your blade," the officer observed after a moment. "More than he does mine." He looked tired, suddenly, his eyes dark and shadowed. "I am done here now, I think. Back to my quarters, will you escort me?"

"Of course, sir," Robert said, moving to retrieve the knives from the target and floor. But the officer forestalled him with a hand and went to remove them himself.

It had been a one-time thing, then, to touch the officer's knives. Robert couldn't resent that, and not just because his governor would have twitched to life at the thought. They were beautiful weapons, but his fingers still tingled from touching one. He didn't think he could live as the officer did, with Joslire's soul always pressing at him, no matter how much he had loved Joslire. No matter how much he missed him.

Still, he hoped the officer didn't regret it, letting him handle the blade. It had been something, to touch it once. Something like saying goodbye.

The officer was ready now, and Robert straightened to attention, prepared to let Koscuisko pass him by so he could take his place at his back. Instead the officer stopped beside him, to present him with his own, disobedient knife and meet him eye to eye.

"It was good of you to come, and mourn with me my Joslire."

"Our Joslire," Robert said, greatly daring. He didn't know where the courage had come from, except maybe from the knife. Could knives hold such a thing? If a weave could, then maybe.

"Our Joslire," the officer agreed, so quietly Robert might have dreamt it. "Come, now. Let us go, before my gentlemen become by my absence too concerned."

His hand brushed Robert's neck once, lightly, and then he moved to take his place at last, stepping through the door with Robert one pace behind.


End file.
